Awards

Six engineering students earn prestigious National Science Foundation fellowships

Jeff Zehnder — Thu, 24 Apr 2025 15:37:47 +0000

Six engineering students earn prestigious National Science Foundation fellowships Jeff Zehnder Thu, 04/24/2025 - 09:37

The National Science Foundation has bestowed six prestigious Graduate Research Fellowship Program awards to University of Colorado Boulder engineering students.

The national awards recognize and support outstanding grad students from across the country in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields who are pursuing research-based master’s and doctoral degrees.

Awardees receive a $37,000 annual stipend and cost of education allowance for the next three years as well as professional development opportunities.

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BOLD students shine with spring 2025 undergraduate awards

Charles Ferrer — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 17:09:13 +0000

BOLD students shine with spring 2025 undergraduate awards Charles Ferrer Mon, 04/21/2025 - 11:09

Congratulations to our BOLD community members who have earned spring 2025 graduating awards through the college!

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Engineering student lands prestigious Goldwater Scholarship

Susan Glairon — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 15:42:22 +0000

Engineering student lands prestigious Goldwater Scholarship Susan Glairon Mon, 04/21/2025 - 09:42

Arianna McCarty, a chemical and biological engineering student, received a prestigious Goldwater Scholarship for her research on how Prevotella bacteria may help reduce infections caused by Streptococcus pneumoniae, a major cause of pneumonia.

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Chemical & biological engineering faculty earn Air Force Young Investigator Award

Susan Glairon — Thu, 27 Mar 2025 22:26:30 +0000

Chemical & biological engineering faculty earn Air Force Young Investigator Award Susan Glairon Thu, 03/27/2025 - 16:26

Susan Glairon

Assistant Professors Kōnane Bay and Ankur Gupta from ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering each received a $450,000, three-year grant to advance research relevant to the U.S. Air Force.

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Professor receives ASCE Peurifoy Construction Research Award

Susan Glairon — Wed, 26 Mar 2025 22:36:27 +0000

Professor receives ASCE Peurifoy Construction Research Award Susan Glairon Wed, 03/26/2025 - 16:36

Susan Glairon

Amy Javernick-Will, a professor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering, received the highest academic honor in construction engineering and management from the American Society of Civil Engineers.

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AWWA honors Professor Karl Linden with 2025 A.P. Black Research Award

Susan Glairon — Tue, 25 Mar 2025 18:20:06 +0000

AWWA honors Professor Karl Linden with 2025 A.P. Black Research Award Susan Glairon Tue, 03/25/2025 - 12:20

Professor Karl Linden, chair of ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ��'s Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering Department, has been awarded the 2025 A.P. Black Research Award by AWWA for his pioneering contributions to UV water treatment technology.

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Aircrafts of the future: Boosting aerodynamic performance by engineered surface vibrations

Jeff Zehnder — Mon, 24 Mar 2025 16:34:49 +0000

Aircrafts of the future: Boosting aerodynamic performance by engineered surface vibrations Jeff Zehnder Mon, 03/24/2025 - 10:34

Jeff Zehnder

“This is probably the most radical conceptual advancement for airplanes since the replacement of propellers with jets.” – M.I. Hussein

Mahmoud Hussein is not pulling punches about the potential impact of a major aerospace materials research project.

As the principal investigator of a $7.5 million, five-year Department of Defense Office of Naval Research (ONR) Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI), Hussein is leading an effort to reshape the fundamental character of fluid-structure interactions to reduce drag on high-speed aerospace vehicles—the focus of the project.

“Since the dawn of aviation, aircraft design has been based on the premise of shaping the surface of the vehicle to create lift and minimize drag. Our team is pursuing a new paradigm where the phononic properties, or intrinsic vibrations, of a surface or subsurface provide an additional pathway to interact with the airflow, to enhance the vehicle performance in an unprecedented manner,” said Hussein, the Alvah and Harriet Hovlid Professor in the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Hussein also has a courtesy appointment in the Department of Physics and an affiliation with the Materials Science and Engineering Program.

MURI Partners

University of Colorado Boulder

Mahmoud I. Hussein
Professor & Principal Investigator
Armin Kianfar
Post-Doctoral Associate
Adam Harris
PhD Student

University of Maryland

Christoph Brehm
Associate Professor

Johns Hopkins University

Kevin Hemker
Professor

Purdue University

Joseph Jewell
Associate Professor

Applied Physics Laboratory

Keith Caruso
Principal Staff Engineer
Ken Kane
Researcher

University of Kentucky

Alexandre Martin
Professor

Case Western Reserve University

Bryan Schmidt
Assistant Professor

Office of Naval Research (Program Directors)

Eric Marineau
Eric Wuchina

Phononic Subsurfaces

Turbulent airflow is detrimental to the fuel economy and the surface temperature of aircrafts as they soar through the atmosphere. This research aims to mitigate the transition to turbulence using phononic subsurfaces (PSubs) – synthetic designed materials affixed beneath the surface of a wing or vehicle body that passively manipulate small-amplitude vibrations, and by extension flow fluctuations, point-by-point along the surface.

Turbulence and Fuel Economy

Passenger planes consume over 10,000 gallons of jet fuel on a single cross-country trip, so improvements in fuel economy could lead to big savings for airlines. The potential in hypersonic crafts is even more dramatic.

Hypersonic vehicles travel at velocities at least five times the speed of sound. The turbulence that results from such speeds causes the surface of the vehicles to heat up to thousands of degrees, requiring they be constructed of exotic, expensive materials.

“By introducing a phononic subsurface to precisely shape the vibrations along the surface, we can alter the way the air interacts with the vehicle such that we ultimately don’t need to come up with exceedingly high-temperature-resistant materials,” Hussein said. “We’re passively manipulating instabilities in air flow in a manner that is favorable in the boundary layer where the vehicle meets the surrounding air.”

2015 to Today

The concept of PSubs was discovered by Hussein. The work began from a collaboration over 15 years ago between Hussein and then ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� Professor Sedat Biringen, who died in 2020. As leaders in the newly-born research area of phononics and the longstanding field of fluid dynamics, respectively, they worked together to theoretically demonstrate–for the first time–a way to manipulate phonons to improve the efficiency of flight, with tremendous potential for the aerospace industry and prospects for application to water vessels as well.

Recently Hussein gathered a team of experts from across the country to take the concept of PSubs to the next level with this hypersonics MURI grant. Over the duration of the project, the group will develop high-fidelity models and fabricate functional prototypes to effectively characterize and demonstrate the technology in high-speed wind tunnels.

“We’re most confident about this endeavor, because the idea is rooted in fundamental science marrying–in quite a sophisticated fashion–fluid dynamics with condensed matter physics as well as with the emerging field of elastic metamaterials,” Hussein said.

“This is probably the most radical conceptual advancement for airplanes since the replacement of propellers with jets.” – Mahmoud Hussein is not pulling punches about the potential impact of a major aerospace materials research project.

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Xiao earns prestigious membership in the National Academy of Inventors

Alexander James Servantez — Fri, 14 Mar 2025 17:03:49 +0000

Xiao earns prestigious membership in the National Academy of Inventors Alexander Jame… Fri, 03/14/2025 - 11:03

Associate Professor Jianliang Xiao is a “mechanics of materials” expert launching innovations in soft materials and flexible electronics who has been selected as a senior member in the National Academy of Inventors (NAI). The program recognizes rising innovators who have had success securing patents, licensing and commercialization for developed technologies that showcase real impact on the welfare of society.

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Tamara Lehman receives CAREER award to strengthen hardware security

Charles Ferrer — Wed, 12 Mar 2025 14:12:05 +0000

Tamara Lehman receives CAREER award to strengthen hardware security Charles Ferrer Wed, 03/12/2025 - 08:12

Tamara Lehman, assistant professor of computer engineering, has earned a CAREER award through the National Science Foundation to address hardware vulnerabilities in microarchitecture designs while exploring security metrics for future hardware designs.

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Four with ties to CU elected to 2025 class of National Academy of Engineering

Emily Adams — Tue, 25 Feb 2025 20:06:09 +0000

Four with ties to CU elected to 2025 class of National Academy of Engineering Emily Adams Tue, 02/25/2025 - 13:06

Two ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� faculty members, a former faculty member and a distinguished alumnus are among 128 new members elected to the National Academy of Engineering for 2025.

According to NAE, "election to the National Academy of Engineering is among the highest professional distinctions accorded to an engineer. Academy membership honors those who have made outstanding contributions in at least one of the following categories: 'engineering practice, research, or education,' 'pioneering of new and developing fields of technology, major advancements in traditional fields of engineering, or development/implementation of innovative approaches to engineering education' or 'engineering leadership of one or more major endeavors.'"

The four will be formally inducted during the NAE's Annual Meeting in October.

Scott Diddams

For contributions to optical frequency combs and their applications

Electrical engineer and physicist Scott Diddams holds the Robert H. Davis Endowed Chair. He carries out experimental research in the fields of precision spectroscopy and quantum metrology, nonlinear optics, microwave photonics and ultrafast lasers. Diddams earned his PhD degree from the University of New Mexico and previously served as a research physicist, group leader and fellow the National Institute of Standards and Technology. In 2022, he joined the ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� faculty, where he is also the faculty director of the Quantum Engineering Initiative in the College of Engineering and Applied Science. As a postdoc, Diddams built the first optical frequency combs in the lab of Nobel Prize laureate John Hall, and throughout his career, he has pioneered the use of these powerful tools for optical clocks, tests of fundamental physics, novel spectroscopy and astronomy.

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Hanspeter Schaub

For contributions to the control of satellite formations and relative orientations utilizing natural forces, including the use of electrostatics

A distinguished professor and chair of the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences at ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ��, Hanspeter Schaub has made pioneering research advances in spacecraft formation flying, space debris mitigation, attitude dynamics, autonomous spacecraft tasking and charged astrodynamics. His work has been instrumental in high-profile space projects, including the development of key components for the UAE Hope mission to Mars and the creation of the widely used Basilisk software for spacecraft mission simulation. He has been recognized multiple times for excellence in research and education, including the 2024 American Astronautical Society Dirk Brouwer Award for transformational research. He is a Fellow of both AIAA and AAS. Schaub has been a member of the ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� aerospace faculty since 2007 and holds a bachelor's, master's and PhD in aerospace engineering, all from Texas A&M University.

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Dan Frangopol

For contributions to life-cycle civil engineering and leadership in its global development and adoption

Dan Frangopol is a distinguished ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� professor emeritus with a significant career in the university’s Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering. He joined ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� faculty as an associate professor in March 1983. He was promoted to full professor in 1988 and became an emeritus professor in 2006. Renowned as an expert in structural reliability, optimization and life-cycle engineering, Frangopol earned the title "Father of Life-Cycle Analysis" from the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). In November 2023, the ASCE board of directors established the Dan M. Frangopol Medal for Life-Cycle Engineering of Civil Structures in honor of Frangopol. Frangopol, currently a professor at Lehigh University, holds Lehigh’s inaugural Fazlur R. Khan Endowed Chair of Structural Engineering and Architecture. Frangopol received his diploma in engineering from the Institute of Civil Engineering, Bucharest, Romania, in 1969 and his doctorate of applied sciences from the University of Liège, Belgium, in 1976.

Related reading:

Civil engineering society establishes medal to honor Frangopol

Charles W. Hull (EngrPhys’61) and President Biden

Charles W. Hull

For the invention of 3D printing and the subsequent development of the additive manufacturing industry

After Chuck Hull (EngPhys'61) completed his degree, he worked with a DuPont subsidiary before going on to invent the solid imaging process known as stereolithography. This became the basis of the first commercial 3D printing technology, which spurred the dawning of a dynamic industry in the United States. Upon securing a stereolithography patent in 1986, Hull then founded 3D Systems Corp. Hull initiated the 3D printing industry and remains involved in the corporation’s day-to-day operations through a range of innovative applications, including state-of-the art production of 3D printers to the first home-certified 3D printer, the award-winning Cube. A member of the National Inventors Hall of Fame, Hull is credited as the inventor on more than 90 U.S. patents in the field of ion optics and 3D printing. As a strong advocate for education and training of youth in all aspects of this rapidly growing technology, Hull received an honorary degree from the University of Colorado Board of Regents in 2016.

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��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� alum’s invention of 3D printing recognized by President Biden

Two ��Ҵ�ý�ƽ�� faculty members, a former faculty member and a distinguished alumnus will be among 128 new members inducted into the academy in October.

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